


recompense

by sospes



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, Pegging
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-27
Updated: 2013-12-27
Packaged: 2018-01-06 09:11:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1105032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sospes/pseuds/sospes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tauriel exerts her power the only way she knows how.</p>
            </blockquote>





	recompense

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt on _The Hobbit_ kink meme on LJ.

“Tauriel?” 

Tauriel’s busy. Her bowstring snapped this afternoon, right in the middle of a spider hunt, leaving her vulnerable and, oh, completely open to the shequeen bearing down on her from behind. The only reason she’s not high up in the branches right now, wrapped in webbing and waiting for the dinner table, is her Greenwood prince: he saved her, sending a shaft lancing straight through the beast’s gullet, and she’d just _watched_ , pathetic and civilian, as it writhed and keened to its death, useless bow in hand. So now she’s restringing, carefully and methodically, and she really doesn’t want anybody asking foolish questions and—

“Tauriel? Are you listening to me?”

The blunt answer is no, but Legolas is looking at her with a peculiar expression in his eyes, one she can’t quite place. She says, “I am now. What is it?” 

And that’s when she realises where he’s standing. More precisely, what he’s looking at. Even more precisely, which drawer is open. 

Legolas’ eyebrow is quirked in that way it does when his interest is really piqued. “Ah, why do you have so many?” he asks, and she notices that he studiously avoids asking how many _of what_. There are spots of colour high on his cheeks, and, bowstring or not, Tauriel feels something familiar rise in her gut, something warm and fierce and _burning_.   
She sets her bow aside, rises to her feet. She’s unshod, her hair unbraided: they’ve just finished their hunt, just finished their work, and the adrenaline is still fading from their veins. The same thing is mirrored in Legolas’ eyes, the same tiredness mixed with nervous, restless energy, and she says, only half joking, “I like to let my partners choose.” 

There are over fifty in the drawer Legolas has stumbled on, some carved from the hearts of trees, some carefully crafted from veined stone or gleaming gems. She has some traded for from the farther corners of Arda, from the hobbits of the Shire and the Easterlings of the South, and then those that were made by her next door neighbour, the hoary old elf who always takes the time to tell her how _they don’t make them like they did in my day_. They are cared for, polished and cleaned regularly, laid out on soft cloths and lovingly handled. 

The prince of Mirkwood is wide-eyed, colour high in his cheeks and breath coming just a little faster than normal. 

Tauriel can’t quite suppress a smile. She pads silently across her chambers, comes to stand at Legolas’ side, close enough that he can feel the heat of her body but not close enough to let him touch her. “See anything you like?” she asks. 

Legolas’ hand shoots out, and he picks up what is pretty much the largest one she owns. It’s old, very old: the dwarves of Erebor made it for her before the dragon came, before they lost everything, before the elvenking turned his back on their allies – not that anyone else knows that, no, to them it’s just a pretty thing, dark in colour, jet shot through with paler veins of colour. Legolas wraps greedy fingers around it and presents it to her. “This one,” he says, and there’s the faintest tremor in his voice. 

Tauriel puts aside thoughts of the dwarves-that-were, and smiles a smile that, although she’d never admit it, is almost predatory. “In that case, my prince,” she says, “take off your clothes.”

He’s naked faster than he nocks arrows, half hard and flushed, and that splits her smile wider – because she might be a burden in the field, might be the foolish girl that her men think her to be, losing knives and breaking bowstrings, but here, in her chambers, alone with the only one of her kin she’s always wanted to impress, she’s in control. She sheds her robe, letting it pool around her ankles, and takes the dwarven black from Legolas’ unresisting fingers. “On the bed,” she says, and reaches for the oil. 

Legolas, it turns out, is whiny and needy when she’s buried deep inside him, perfect hair slicked with sweat and muscles shaking with every rough thrust, and he grabs at her sheets, carelessly ripping them apart with a warrior’s strength. She, however, isn’t a princeling—she knows how much these things cost, knows how hard they are to mend, to clean—and, as punishment, she doesn’t let him come until he gets on his knees in front of her, toy still inside him, and apologises, kisses her feet, almost sobs with frustration. When he does come, it’s messy and _loud_ , and she makes him clean up after himself, clean until her sheets are like new and her floor is shining. She doesn’t let him touch her, not until he’s spent and half-conscious in her torn sheets, and he reaches out for her with tired hands, pulls her close, shrouds them in her hair and falls asleep still twitching. 

It’s very hard for her to admit that she’s wanted this. She’s a captain of the guard, a professional and a fighter, not some moony harpist: she’s stronger than this, stronger than anyone who cares to try their hand against her – but that doesn’t stop the surge of joy in her throat, doesn’t stop the rightness from flooding through her heart. She takes a breath, then another, and doesn’t fall asleep. 

 

“I dare you.” 

They’re feasting, tables groaning with the best the kitchens have to offer, and Tauriel’s plate is piled high with the particular chestnut fancies she could eat all day. It’s a celebration, a celebration of life and victory and love. Wine flows and laughter rings through the Greenwood. 

Tauriel eyes Legolas with suspicion. They’re sitting together on one of the tables reserved for the guard: Legolas left high table hours ago, about when his father started calling for the dancing bears to be brought in, despite the fact that the Greenwood has no dancing bears, _because I’m the king and I get what I want!_ Now, they’re side by side with their comrades, thigh pressed close to thigh, and Legolas’ hand is warm on her back. 

She swallows down the fancy, takes a mouthful of wine. Her head is pleasantly hazy. “Dare me what?” 

Legolas nods towards high table, where Thranduil is now on the table, winecup in each hand. “My father.” 

“Your father?” she asks, more than a little surprised. “Really?” 

Legolas shrugs, smiles an amused little smile, and doesn’t answer. 

“Isn’t that a little strange?” she asks – although she’s not complaining. Thranduil has a certain elegance to him, a grace that befits his kingship, but she sees the haughtiness in his eyes whenever he looks at her, sees the snobbery, and it twists a knife in her gut, deeper and deeper. She can’t help who she was born as. She repeats, “He’s _your father_.” She’s hoping the stress will bring Legolas out of his feast-high state. 

There’s a strange calmness in his eyes, a calmness that’s not calm, not really, rather it’s resentful, almost angry. Thranduil isn’t perfect, they both know that. Legolas has never spoken much about his father, and after his mother, that silence only deepened. He shrugs again. “I can cope,” he says, deceptively light. “And I dare you.” 

He knows she can’t resist a dare, no matter how much it feels like she’s a pawn, just someone with a chestful of toys who can get one up on a cold, irresponsible father, and over the din of the feast, over laughter and joy and drunken revelry, she says quietly, “Of course, my prince.” 

Legolas’ expression is determinedly empty, and he takes another drink. His lips are stained with wine. 

Tauriel finds Thranduil in the dance. Her dress is gossamer thin, clinging to her body with every spin—she chose it because of that, chose it so she could feel Legolas’ eyes on her from across the hall—and she smoothes it down over her hips, pulls her hair over one shoulder. She dances like she’s doing it for herself, eyes shut and head thrown back, dances like there’s no one in the room but her, dances like she fights, like she shoots – and she feels it when their king comes near, feels the heat of his body, smells the tang of his sweat. Her heart thuds steadily in her chest. 

“Tauriel,” she hears him say. “Tauriel.” 

She opens her eyes, looks back over her shoulder. Her hair gleams in the warm light, and she says, “My lord.” 

His hands land on her hips, light and hot, and she thinks about Legolas’ calm. Thranduil can be a cold king, cruel and prejudiced and selfish, and there’s a part of her that wants to know why her prince can be so cold towards his father – but, equally, she knows there are some things it’s not her place to ask. Legolas might share her bed, might submit to her touch and her command, but she’s not his keeper. 

Thranduil’s lips are wet and greedy against her neck, and she bucks back into his embrace, laughs a breathy laugh – then she’s gone, dancing forward, away from him, casting a single heavy glance back over her shoulder then slipping out of the feast hall. She doesn’t need to check that he’s following her. She’s done this enough times with enough powerful men to know what they like to see in their fly-by-nights – and the sound of sloppy footfalls only confirms what she already knows. 

Legolas watches her go. He sits back in his chair, winecup in hand, watches the dancers sway around each other, and doesn’t follow. 

Thranduil catches up with Tauriel just outside the door to her chambers, and by now she’s feeling just enough of the wine-fuzz that she laughs when he catches her by the hand, spins her round to face him. Strands of her hair catch against her spit-slick lips, and the elvenking rubs his thumb against her cheek, says, “Why do you make me chase you?” 

Her cheeks are hot under his touch. “Because I am not easy,” she says, almost sharply, and slips backwards into her rooms. He follows her, eyes dark and warm, and she says, “And because I do this my way.” 

Thranduil’s eyebrow lifts, and the gesture is such an echo of his son’s that, just for a moment, Tauriel feels something stir deep inside her, something almost akin to the peace she can sometimes find in Legolas’ arms. Sometimes. “Is that right?” he says, and the door closes behind him with a soft snick. 

Tauriel thinks of his prejudice and his coldness, his sometimes-cruelty and his ofttimes-arrogance, and she says, “Yes. Strip, my lord.” 

There’s a moment where he stands still, lips twisted and expression haughty, but then she runs a hand down from her throat to her stomach, dancing her own touch between her breasts. His gaze follows, greedy and wanton, and he’s unclasping his robes, letting them fall from his shoulders. He starts to unlace his trousers, to pull them away from his pale hips, and Tauriel turns away. He’s hers, she knows that now, and she pads to her drawers, opens the top. She glances back at her lord, her king, naked in her bedchamber, and she says, “Choose.” 

Thranduil moves to her side, looks down at her collection – then looks up at her sharply, says, “You’re bold, Sylvan. I should—”

She slaps him. The shock in his eyes is almost worth all the condescension, and before he can gather himself, she says, “I said choose. And don’t talk.” 

The look in Thranduil’s eyes is insulted and interested, aroused and astonished. He looks so much like his son, and Tauriel takes a breath to chastise, to lash out again – but there’s no need. Thranduil chooses with long fingers, chooses one that’s long rather than thick, made from the heart of an ancient elm and carved at the tip with ridges that, Tauriel has learnt, are far more than decorative. He presses it into her hand, gaze dark and lips turned up in a smirk, and says nothing. 

She takes him on the floor like a dog, a hand twisted in his hair, pulling his head back, and she knows that she shouldn’t take so much pleasure in the bruise growing on his cheek but she still does, and she doesn’t care enough to be ashamed. Thranduil doesn’t make a sound, quite unlike his son, and when he comes in a mess on the stone floor, she presses his forehead to the ground with her foot and says, “Clean it with your tongue.” She expects him to argue, but he does it without a word, and when it’s like he’s never been there, she kicks him out. After, she falls asleep on top of her sheets in nothing but her skin. 

She’s woken in the hours before dawn by the door creaking quietly open, but she’s not afraid. She recognises those footsteps, knows that scent, and when Legolas slips into bed with her, she doesn’t smile, just goes back to sleep without a word. 

 

“They’re here.” 

It’s been six months since the Battle of Five Armies, six months since Tauriel stood among the ruin of so many bodies and just couldn’t stop shaking, six months since she saw the dwarf and his nephews crowned in state on the mountains of golden treasure. Six months since the slaughter, six months since the celebration. Six months of Thranduil making tentative yet somehow still haughty advances towards the Mountain, six months of silence in return. 

Or, _almost_ six months of silence. The message crossed their borders a week ago: _we accept your invitation_. Nothing else. 

Tauriel stands at Legolas’ shoulder at the door to their realm and watches as the dwarven embassy plods across the causeway. “Yes,” she says, and then, “I remember the two at the front. Dark hair and golden hair. Kili, Fili.”

“So do I,” Legolas replies. “They were two of the ones who... visited us before.” 

Tauriel leans slightly closer so the rank and file can’t hear. “You have reminded your father to not throw them in the cells, haven’t you?” she quips. 

He narrows his eyes at her, says, “Multiple times.” His shoulders square, ever so slightly. “They fought bravely,” he says. “They might be dwarves, but they didn’t deserve that treatment. Hopefully father understands that.” He pauses, and his nose wrinkles. “Although I can’t promise he does.” 

Tauriel huffs a soft laugh, watches the dwarves eye the guards to the front door with suspicion. 

She feels Legolas looking at her thoughtfully. She doesn’t return his gaze, keeps staring dead ahead as she was taught to for parade so long ago. Finally he says, “But I imagine your healing one of them helps our diplomatic relations. Especially seeing as he’s here now.”   
Tauriel doesn’t need the reminder. Even though she can gut an orc without second thought, the sight of red blood turns her stomach. She saw the dark haired dwarf with blood on his hands and his leg and she couldn’t not help, especially when she watched his golden haired companion hold his head in his lap like there was nothing else that mattered in the world. Affection, loyalty. Love. She’s a soldier, but she has a heart, and when the dark haired boy garbled the other’s name in his fevered stupor, mashing the syllables together with _please_ and _don’t go_ and _brother i love you_ , something sat so right in the pit of her stomach. 

They fought together, those two, whirling around each other on the battlefield in perfect harmony, Kili healed as if he was never hurt. They saved her life when the orcs were closing in and Legolas was nowhere to be seen, and when she breathed her thanks, Fili said _we owed you one_. 

“Yes,” she says neutrally, and ignores Legolas’ gaze. “I imagine it does.” 

He’s brooding. She leaves him to it. 

An honour guard escorts the dwarves—six in total, only two of whom she recognises—to the king’s throne, and Thranduil, rising to the occasion, doesn’t simply lounge in his seat as Tauriel feared he might. He greets the dwarves almost courteously, introduces his son and his kingdom, and Tauriel can’t help but feel like she’s just tagging along as the king takes the embassy on a brief tour of the realm. No matter. Boredom is better than war. 

When they’re halfway to the grand hall (neatly bypassing the cells, Tauriel notices with a smile), Kili drops back, falls into step with her. Or tries to, but seeing as his legs are so much shorter she finds herself taking pity and instead falling into step with him. He looks up at her wryly, says, “Thanks for that. And for before.” 

She cocks her head. “You don’t have to thank me,” she says. “Saving my life was enough.” 

“I want to,” Kili says, then corrects himself: “ _We_ want to.” His gaze flickers almost unconsciously to his brother, deep in conversation with Thranduil. “Any way we can. We figured that helping to smooth things along between your king and our uncle was a good first step.” 

She laughs lightly. “So your king hasn’t lost any of his fire, then?” 

His lips twist, but he’s still smiling. “Not at all,” he replies. “I’m just sorry it took us this long to wear him down. He can be stubborn.” 

Abruptly Tauriel realises that they’re being watched. It’s not obvious, not really, but she’s used to the way men look at her, like she’s doing something wrong by wielding bow and knife instead of oven and lute, used to the stares and the whispers – and so when she looks up and catches Legolas watching her—no, watching _them_ , her and Kili both—with a studied blankness in his eyes, she’s not surprised. She’d call it possessive if she didn’t know better. 

“I’m glad you did,” she replies finally, and smiles at the young dwarf who would be dead if it weren’t for her. “And I hope there’s a future for our peoples.” 

Kili nods to her, eyes bright and strangely hopeful, but then the party is juddering to a halt and Thranduil is throwing orders around, sending Legolas to supervise the changing of the guard and Tauriel to check on the drill that’s about to start on the training ground. Kili waves goodbye with a lopsided smile then turns back to his brother, and the last thing Tauriel sees is Kili’s hand resting with natural ease at the small of Fili’s back. As she straightens quivers and nudges booted feet into correct parade rest on the training ground, she thinks of his fevered babbling and the fear in his brother’s eyes, so long ago. 

She doesn’t think about Legolas. 

Tauriel sits alone in her rooms that night, unstrung bow across her lap, and works the new bowstring between her fingers, checks it for weaknesses and unevenness, winds the ends around her hands and stretches it taught. It’s not perfect, but it’s acceptable, and she begins the process of restringing her bow. It’s a simple task, yes, but she pours herself into it because she still remembers the day her bowstring broke, remembers the humiliation and the fear and the anger. She has worked so hard for who she is—

A polite cough alerts her to the fact that she’s not alone. 

Her hand tenses around her bow, despite the fact that she has no arrows, and she’s on her feet in a second, startled like a faun – but then she relaxes, untenses. The two dwarves are just inside her door, Fili holding the door open behind him, Kili smiling at her nervously. “Sorry!” he says. “We didn’t mean to surprise you. The door was open...”

Tauriel shifts her weight into a more relaxed position, says, “That’s alright.” And then, frowning, she adds, “Why aren’t you at the feast?” 

“Too many elves,” Fili says flippantly, but his eyes are smiling. 

“But not the one we were looking for,” Kili completes, a mirror of his brother. 

Tauriel quirks an eyebrow. “You were looking for me?” Something warm and familiar curls like a dragon in her belly, lighting the furnace from inside. She sets her bow down gently and pretends not to notice that Fili finally lets the door shut behind him. 

Kili shrugs, shoots his brother a glance that he probably thinks is surreptitious but that really isn’t. “We have a proposal for you,” he says, and his voice is suddenly tighter, tenser. “It’s a tradition of sorts,” he continues. “A custom. Something we do, just the two of us, you understand, not our people as a whole. Just us. Something we, I don’t know, _need_ to do. A way of thanking those we owe our lives to.” 

“Does that happen often?” Tauriel asks lightly. 

“More than you’d think,” Fili answers gruffly, and the way he rolls his eyes in his brother’s direction tells Tauriel all she needs to know about who’s responsible for _that_. 

“ _Anyway_ ,” Kili stresses, and he’s all set to launch into another spiel about custom and thanks and tradition—

“I understand,” Tauriel says softly, and she might be interrupting before he’s finished but she does, she really does. They’re dwarves, dwarf warriors at that, proud and noble and full of honour – and that’s life that doesn’t tend to lend itself to the easy effusion of thanks. War is action, not words, and it teaches you that sometimes words just aren’t enough. Sometimes you have to let go, give yourself over completely. Sometimes that’s all you know. 

Fili’s the first to sink to his knees, hair bright as the fire that flickers in the sconces, and he says, voice thick with a reverence that she knows he would never let slip anywhere else, in any other situation, “My lady.” 

Kili follows his brother in silence, face upturned, eyes dark. They are so small. 

Tauriel smiles at them both, and says, “Take off your clothes. Pile them neatly beside the door. Don’t touch each other.” It’s the last command they’re going to have the most trouble with, she can tell, but she can also tell that, in this moment, they will obey her to the last. Fili starts with his shirt buttons, Kili with his trouser lacing, and as they strip themselves with the efficiency she would expect from those raised for combat, she takes the drawer out of her cabinet, places it on the ground in front of them. She says, “Choose for each other. Quickly.” 

Fili picks dark blue Easterling glass shot through with darts of silver without a second’s thought, places it silently on the ground next to his brother’s knees, looks up at Tauriel for her approval. She doesn’t give it, not yet, just waits for Kili. He’s more thoughtful, forehead furrowed with a concentration that doesn’t really fit with his nakedness, but he finally reaches out, picks bronze burnished to such a sheen that it gleams like fiery gold. He shares a look with his brother as he places it next to his knees, a look that Tauriel doesn’t understand, couldn’t understand: a look of longing and joy and love, of long nights by the fire and long days under the burning sun. 

Tauriel steps out of her clothes, and doesn’t think of her Greenwood prince. 

“Good,” she says, runs a hand through Kili’s hair, grips Fili by the chin. “Good.” 

She makes Kili watch. She pushes him roughly to one side, tells him not to touch himself, not to get involved, and then she drags Fili to her bed, slicks him with a quick and gentle touch, takes him slow and leisurely with gold and bronze. Fili whimpers quietly, muscles cording in his back, and when he reaches for himself she slaps his hand away, hauls his head back roughly, bites at his neck. His breath comes fast, faster, heavy and desperate, and she hauls his arms behind his back, pushes his face further into the pillows, feels his body tremble with every thrust. 

Then Kili groans his brother’s name, low and guttural, and Tauriel freezes, pulls out of Fili so quickly he yelps. She rounds on Kili, still on his knees, lips wet and gaping, harder than the stone his people work, and snaps, “I didn’t say you could talk.” She takes him by the hair, drags him to the bed where his brother is rutting against the sheets like an animal, sits on the edge and pushes his head between her legs. He’s sloppy and a little overeager but heat thrums through her nonetheless, and she pushes him away after only a moment, feels her breath coming faster. He sprawls back on the cold stone, gaze flicking between her and Fili, and Tauriel tosses him the oil, says, “Do it yourself.” 

She turns her attention back to Fili, and finds him watching her with wide, submissive eyes. A dangerous smile dances across her lips at that, and she turns him onto his back, sits astride his face and winds her hands in his hair. He doesn’t need any more encouragement than that, gripping her thighs with hands that are stubby by elvish standards but so much stronger than her grip could ever be. She rides his face and watches as Kili slides one finger, two, inside himself, never looking away from his brother. 

She steps away from Fili when she’s good and wet—he’s better than his brother: more attentive, less distracted by his own enthusiasm—and says, “Kili. On the bed, now. And don’t touch him.” 

Kili does as he’s told, and Tauriel takes up the Easterling glass, rubs her thumb along its length. She turns Kili so he’s on his knees, ready and waiting, and as she slides into him in one slow, deep movement, she looks up at Fili, sees the need in his eyes, hears the hitch in his breathing. She says, “Stop watching him.” She pauses, pulls out of Kili, drives back in again, harder, harder. 

The glint of silver in his hair catches the firelight, gleams bright and beautiful, and she reaches out, undoes the clasp, turns it over in her hand. She doesn’t read dwarf runes, but she doesn’t need to, because on instinct she grabs Fili’s hair, pulls him to her, and sees that he has its twin. She knows what these mean without reading, knows what they are without asking: they bind them together, remind them of who they are and who they belong to, tiny scraps of metal that speak more than words ever could. Tauriel takes the second from Fili’s hair, but takes it slowly, carefully, with a care that says _i would never dream of taking him from you_ , and presses the pair hard into his palm. She grips his chin, pulls his head up, looks him in the eye. “Braid my hair,” she says. “Braid it with these.” 

Fili’s hands are shaking, but there’s a solemnity in his eyes that she recognises, that she respects. He understands. “My lady,” he says, and then, “Thank you.” 

She only lets them come when she finally gives them permission to touch each other. 

After, Tauriel lets them sleep, curled around each other in the centre of her bed, and goes out into the night, nothing but a thin gown between her and the spring chill. She runs her fingers through her hair, feels the dwarven braids between her fingers: they’re thicker than the ones her mother taught her, thicker and rougher and somehow more honest, and they’re finished with the silver clasps that could never be hers. She goes to the feast hall, wanders through the mess left by the revel, doesn’t leave a footprint behind her. 

She feels his gaze before she sees him. “Legolas,” she says lightly. “You’re up late.”   
“As are you,” he answers, and materialises out of the shadows like there’s nothing wrong with stalking her through the darkness. “I trust the dwarves kept you entertained.” 

She gives him a sideways glance, smiles just a little. “Fine stamina for such a short race,” she comments. 

Legolas is silent. 

Tauriel looks up at the arches of their home, studies the carvings on the ceiling and wishes she could see the starlight. She wonders how it would glimmer on the clasps in her hair, wonders how many times the brothers have chased each other and laughed together underneath the vault of the sky. She smiles, and thinks about the way Kili grasped his brother’s hip as they fell asleep, how Fili echoed the curve of Kili’s body with his own. 

Legolas touches her arm. “I trust you,” he says, eyes dark. “You know that, yes?” 

“Of course,” Tauriel replies, and pulls her dwarven braids over her shoulder, lets them cascade over her breast and ghost against her skin with the whisper of a love that she can only borrow in the starry night.

_finis_


End file.
